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Gutenberg! The Musical!
Gutenberg! The Musical! is a musical written by Scott Brown and Anthony King. Brown and King developed the show at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre in New York City, where it ran for over a year. The show was part of the 2005 and 2006 New York Musical Theatre Festival and ran at the Jermyn Street Theatre in London in January 2006. Gutenberg! The Musical! opened off-Broadway on December 3, 2006 at 59E59 and then transferred to The Actors' Playhouse on January 16, 2007. The production closed on May 6, 2007. The off-Broadway production was directed by Alex Timbers with music directed by T.O. Sterrett. It starred Christopher Fitzgerald and Jeremy Shamos, and was understudied by Ryan Karels. History The show was originally produced as a 45-minute one-act, workshopped at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre in New York and the 2005 New York Musical Theatre Festival, starring the authors, Scott Brown and Anthony King. These early versions of the show were Directed by Charlie Todd and Music Directed & Accompanied by Barry Wyner. The search engine, Google, makes a wonderful cameo appearance in the show. The full two-act version of the show premiered at The Jermyn Street Theatre in London in January 2006. That production was Music Directed & Accompanied by Michael Roulston and also starred the authors, Scott Brown and Anthony King. In September 2006, Chris Fitzgerald and Jeremy Shamos were cast in the roles of Bud & Doug for the 2006 New York Musical Theatre Festival. That production was directed by Dave Mowers and Music Directed & Accompanied by Matt Castle and won awards for "Best Book" and "Best Performance." In March 2008, The Landless Theatre Company produced the Washington, DC premiere. Directed by John Sadowsky and Music Directed & Accompanied by Charles Johnson, the production starred real life brothers Andrew Lloyd Baughman and Matt Baughman as Bud and Doug. "The Baughmans...are fetchingly eager, singing with skill and gusto while gamely dancing in every style you can think of. You have to love the unselfconscious way the Baughmans just do it". Nelson Pressley of The Washington Post In September of 2008, Gutenberg! The Musical! made its West Coast premiere at Strawberry Theatre Workshop in Seattle. Starring Troy Fischnaller (Doug) and MJ Sieber (Bud), with piano accompaniment by Don Darryl Rivera, and directed by Greg Carter. "Fischnaller's Doug is giddily foul-mouthed with self-congratulation, and Sieber has a twinkle in his eye even as he works himself into a sweaty state of breathless zeal. Both performers toil feverishly to keep director Greg Carter's pace for the show—a five-shot-espresso-with-a-Red-Bull-chaser momentum from start to finish. The brakes are completely disabled on this speeding clown car of inside theater jokes." - Kevin Phinney of the Seattle Weekly. Plot The play is performed as a backer's audition by two characters named Bud and Doug, the fictional authors of a musical about Johannes Gutenberg, which they pitch to producers who might put their show up on Broadway. Because they don't have a cast or an orchestra, Bud and Doug wear hats with the nearly 30 characters' names on them and play all of the roles themselves. In the play-within-a-play, Johann Gutenberg is a wine presser who invents the printing press. An evil monk tries to stop him, and a beautiful girl named Helvetica loves him. Musical Numbers ACT I 1. Prologue/Schlimmer 2. I Can't Read 3. Haunted German Wood 4. The Press Song 5. I Can't Read (Reprise) 6. Biscuits 7. What's The Word? 8. Stop The Press 9. Tomorrow Is Tonight ACT II 1. Second Prologue 2. Words, Words, Words 3. Monk With Me 4. Might As Well (Go To Hell) 5. Festival! 6. Finale Nominations GUTENBERG! THE MUSICAL! was nominated for: -The 2007 Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding New Off-Broadway Musical -The 2007 Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Musical Anthony King & Scott Brown were nominated for: -The 2007 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Book of a Musical Alex Timbers was nominated for: -The 2007 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Director of a Musical Category: New York City